"It is not really difficult to construct a series of inferences, each dependent upon its predecessor and each simple in itself. After doing so, one may produce a startling effect."
– A.C.Doyle, Sherlock Holmes, The Adventure of the Dancing Men.
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Dimitri's P.O.V :
It took me more than an hour to calm down the hysteric Rose, now I am sitting on the rocking chair in Rose's nursery with a sleepy child in my arms. I could hear her whimper from time to time, make me hate myself more and more on how much pain I have caused to my little angel and my wife due to my angry outburst, I have no idea how am going to fix the damage I caused to my married life. I have crossed the boundaries and spoken words that should have been never uttered, I can't even find any hope in me that she will forgive me and give me another chance, after all those hard work from both our parts to build a relationship it took only a few words from me to ruin everything, I don't even know how I will face her again.
"Dimitri", I heard Philip whispering my name, and turned towards the direction of the sound to see him and Bella standing at the door with sad faces, "Dr.Stephen and the patrol team leader are at the office waiting for you."
Bella walked into the room and tried to take Rose from my arms, but I tightened my hold her small body refusing to give her to anyone. Bella stopped and looked back at Philip helplessly, who sighed and walked in placing a hand on my shoulders lowered himself to ear level, "there is a lot of works to do Alpha, we have news. Rose will be safe with Bella". I sighed and stood up, placing a soft kiss on my daughter's head I gave her to Bella and watched her snuggle close to the Crescents' (Beta Female) neck.
"We haven't heard from Tina yet", I heard Bella whisper before I walking out of the room she know I heard that too.
"She ran towards the northern borders, I think she is heading to the home pack let us give her time reach home before we contact them and panic them as well.", I said before walking away, half hoping that she will come back to the house after a run without going to Lunar Spirit.
I stood in front of my office and took a deep breath before opening the door and walk in, ready to face any news waiting for me at the other side.Dr. Stephen and Donovan, the patrol team lead stood up to greet us as we walked into the room.
"Beta said you people have news for me? ", I said going directly to the business without wasting a second.
Donovan nodded towards the doctor, signaling him to start, so I turned my attention towards him who handover a file to me, "The autopsy on Irene's body is done, and my findings are in this file, for now, I will brief you on main findings " I took it from him and nodded him to go on placing the file on my desk.
"Well to relieve our mind, there was no sexual harassment on the girl", I could feel myself relaxing a bit on hearing that, most of the females that turned out dead around different packs were sexually harassed before they were murdered, at least this young one was spared from that horror.
"The death took place one day before and the body was kept frozen before they dumbed it here... and the body was gutted just before they dump it here, the cause of death is a single stab with a silver knife to her heart, but her limps were broken before she died it seems cause they were half healed in that wrong positions."
"If she was dead before a day then what about all that blood on her and the forest floor?", I asked him, rather confused.
"The blood on her and floor was not her blood, I had a vile of her blood with me which was taken for usual yearly check-up before she goes to her friend's place, when I noticed the oddity in the time of her death I did a quick basic D.N.A analysis and it turned out that the blood is not her's, it is the same type but someone else's, the DNA does not match. Further analysis of the blood on her body showed that was not fresh blood, but frozen ones.", he stopped and nodded at Donovan.
Then Donovan filled us in our further details and progresses in the investigation, "So.. when doc informed us of this we did a little more searching in the area and a little ahead of our border, and as an act of God, one of our trackers stumbled upon an almost empty bag of blood discarded near some bushes, we took it back to the doctor and confirmed that we have a match, the bag had the name of the blood bank from were it is taken, so we have two members of the team on the way to the blood bank for further inquiry. And on further investigation on the no man's land, we found a little-abandoned cabin, we caught scents of rogues there, along with the scent of blood and the girl but there was no scent of little Rose there and seems like they have used some chemical to hide their scent before they enter our territory. We still have few members there snooping around to see if we can get any more evidence even though the chances are really low.",
"Well done! Good job both of you and your team Donovan, this is a big achievement considering the previous cases, I think they are growing confident that they can get away with doing anything.", I appreciated them, feeling proud of my pack members.
"Getting back to the evidence in our hands, since we couldn't get Rose's scent on the cabin, the teddy was not taken to the cabin, they might have waited at the cabin along with the body for someone to bring the teddy to them. That confirms that we have a mole in our pack", I said trying to work out all the points they have thrown at me,"Well Rose had the teddy with her in the evening when Celestina put her to bed and when we checked in on her around 11 before we turn in for the night I remember Celestina trying to take it out of her clutches but failing, but we couldn't find it in the morning, me and Celestina were on our hands and knees whole morning searching for it since she was so persistent in having her teddy with her in the morning."
"So the mole might have taken it from Rose when we were all sleeping?!", Philip exclaimed and the thought of that vile thing near my daughter had my blood boil, with great effort I reigned in Tristan from creating another havoc.
"Philip, get a detailed list of who all spend the night at the packhouse last night and footages from all the cameras we installed recently. Rose's baby monitor was found broken this morning get our tech expert and see if he can recover anything from there, it is in her room. And Gentlemen, be careful of the team you select to work with, select only the trusted ones and news must not spread. ", I instructed them.
"Yes.Alpha.", they replied in unison and stood up to leave.
Philip stopped before stepping out as if he remembered something," Irene's parents came here to discuss with you about the funeral, they want to have it today itself, but you were not approachable the moment so I gave them permission to make the arrangements. The ceremony will be starting in fifteen minutes and they will be expecting the Alpha there, Jace is already there, and I will go with you. Ethan will be staying behind along with a few guards for Bella, Olivia, Rose, and Emily. "
"Okay. Then will meet you at the door, I will go and check one Rose one last time before joining you."
"I will give the instructions to the tech team and join you", Philip said before walking away.
I followed Rose's scent and found both her and Bella in mine and Tina's bedroom, Rose is soundly sleeping on the bed hugging her momma's pillow and Bella is sitting on a chair which she moved to the bedside from the vanity table and watching the sleeping baby with a sad face. Bella stood up from her chair as soon as she felt my presence the room and bowed to Mr, "Sorry Alpha, Rose was so restless and couldn't sleep I had no choice but take her here, Tina's scent helped to calm her down and now she is soundly sleeping."
I nodded."Anything is okay as long as she is comfortable", I said walking into my closet to get a proper dress for the funeral, I picked up a black button down full sleeve shirt and black pants, putting them on I walked out of the closet rolling the sleeves of the shirt to a little below my elbow, walking close to my daughter and placed a soft kiss on her forehead.
"I am sorry for talking to her like that," I said before turning and walking towards the door.
"It's not me you should be apologizing to." She said softly.
"I know.", I sighed heavily and continued, "Ethan will be in charge of the packhouse while me, Philip, Jace, and others attend the funeral of Irene Evans, so if there is something contact him" saying that I walked out of the room.
Closing the bedroom door behind me I walked towards the front door, there my Beta and Gamma are waiting for me, "I hope Philip already filled you in on today's information and you are clear on your instructions.", I asked Ethan without bothering about any courtesy.
"Yes, Alpha. I already have a team patrolling outside and planted at spots inside pack-house and I will be roaming around the place all the time", Ethan replied and I give him a small node before jumping into the SUV Philip already had in the ignition and we sped towards the cemetery.
The ceremony was small, only the parents, siblings and few of the girl's friends talked and as their Alpha I have to give in a few words too, since we are living in close connection with humans we have to do a human funeral type funeral and human friend's of the family and the deceased will also participate. For humans we are a tightly coupled closed community of people living in close to nature, they see us as some sort of nature lovers, who like living close to the forested area. After consoling the grieving family and making sure that all security measures are proper, we decided to head back to the packhouse.
"Dimitri. Philip.", Ethan's voice ringed in my head as he mind-linked with both me and Philip.
"Yes, Ethan.", we replied in unison noting the urgency in his voice.
"We got a call from Lunar Spirit pack few minutes before, asking whether Luna reached home safely. They said she requested permission to cross the borders around noon, stating the purpose as visiting the cemetery and they said she crossed back by around 4 O'clock in the evening, but she hadn't reached the packhouse yet ", Ethan's worried voice rang in our ears again.
"Have you searched the training grounds?", I asked him as both me and Philip broke into a small jog towards the wooded area away from the prying eyes of the humans at the funeral.
"Yes, Alpha. We did. I send men to check the training grounds, the gym, and even the old Beta's place. I have deployed team Zigma to the Northern borders now." he said, team sigma is a ten-member team of the best pack warriors and trackers combined created to act upon the stage of emergencies, a missing Luna is one of the major emergency for a pack of wolves.
"Okay both me and Philip are heading towards the northern borders now, inform the team about our arrival and tell them to keep us informed. And you stay at the packhouse itself, guard the females and kids, and inform Dr.Stephen to keep the infirmary ready if in case needed.", I instructed him as we reached the forest line and shifted into our corresponding wolves ripping our clothes to shreds in the process, that was Tina's favorite shirt.
We ran miles and were closing to the northern borders when the smell of blood started to seep into our nostrils, pushing our wolves forwards we ran towards the direction the smell, praying that she is safe I cant yet to catch her sweet vanilla scent in the air so most probably it is another attack on the pack. The spot of the attack came into view in a few minutes and there laid our northern patrol team beaten and defeated, as soon as we reached there we started checking for any sign of life and were relieved to know most of them are just unconscious from bleeding and exhaustion.
"Ethan. We need a team of paramedics to be sent to the northern borders, there was an ambush on our patrol team. The pack will be on official lockdown from this moment, let the members know that they have to be home by 6 and no one is allowed to wander alone or in pairs to the forest, the kids are not to be left unattended, increase the number of patrols and increase the number of members in each team, gather more men for the patrol", I barked through the mind link to my Gamma, who responded immediately, while accessing the damage at the site. There are dead bodies of the rogues here and there and there is a trail leading to north-west boulders.
"Dimitri look", Philip said as he ran to the body of a rogue, clearly visible in his jaws is a bunch of white furs.
None of the members of my pack have white fur except my Luna.
"Alpha. To the north-west boulders.", the voice of Zigma team leader rang in my head, without listening to the rest of the message I push Tristan in northwest direction, praying for only one person, a person who truly made a difference in my life, the memories flashed through my mind at the moment, the way she smiled, held little Rose and cuddled closer to me night, I can't lose her unlike last time I won't be able to pull through, nor will my daughter or my pack.
I felt my heart breaking and breath stopped as I saw the petite figure lying on the forest floor among the corpse of rogue wolves drenched in blood.
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Hi guys,
Thank you so much for your reponse to the previous chapter, you guys made me so happy with all the feedbacks.
So here is the next chapter, it's little long hope you guys don't mind :) I was planning to update it this weekend but I was not well, so couldn't do much of the writing. Now am feeling better and currently at my office, trying to fix a database procedure :P
For all the Ladies in here "Happy Women's Day", my team is having an ethnic wear day today to celebrate the women's day :) So here am wearing a saree and feeling very uncomfortable while updating my book and fixing a DB issue...
Have a fun day everyone...
Enjoy the chapter... Hope you guys like this one too...
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Love
Niranjana